The Fourth Vision
by Sagan Fox
Summary: It was the fourth vision that made Mulder come back. Spoilers--The Blessing Way


            Hi fanfic fans!  There we are with the alliteration again!  This one I wrote more than a year ago and posted on another site, so now I've decided to tweak it a bit and post it here!  I don't own The X-Files.  If I did it would have ended much, MUCH differently.  And Scully wouldn't have cried so damn much in the 9th season!  I mean, come on, what happened to the Uber-Scully we all know and love?!  Anywho, read, enjoy, review.  All who flame will be met with an author clad only in fire wielding a katana.  And that isn't a pretty sight, folks.  (Insert shameless plug for the fanfic of Discordia the Goddess of Irony here)  Just go read it, it's good! I beta read it myself!  Many thanks to my beta reader Discordia!

On with the show!

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He floated on a bed of branches through the eternal black void of the space between life and death.  Those who traversed this bridge before floated like ether around him, in and out of his field of vision.

      His body fought to stay functional while his spirit fought to decide to go forward or to go back.  To go forward would be to leave this world behind, to let himself die, to rest, to discover the ultimate Truth.  To go back would be to fight, to keep searching, to feel pain and anger and fear, to live.  His recently deceased father told him to go back, that his sister was not here, that he must fight the darkness.  His trusted friend said that the truth he sought was to be given to him if he were to go forward, but that there was no justice here, without which the truth doesn't matter.  The unnamed, unremembered test subjects cried out for this justice, but his own tired body cried out for rest.

      One more figure came to him, stepping out of the ethereal smoke to the bed on which he lay.  Mulder turned his head slightly toward the figure, unable to recognize the face he stared into, that of a well-built bald man in a Navy captain's uniform.  The only thing Mulder found faintly familiar were his piercing blue eyes.  

      "Captain William Scully Sr., reporting for duty.  I've been told not to call you Fox.  You aren't the only one who seeks the truth, Mr. Mulder," said the man as he stepped closer to Mulder.

      "Dana needs to see it as much as you do.  She is as involved in this as you are, and like you she doesn't give up very easily.  If you go forward you will find the truth you seek, but she won't.  My Dana may be as stubborn as her old man, but she won't be able to find her truth if her tools are taken away.  The only way she will get her tools back is if she gets you back.  If you don't return to her, the work you both have done will be destroyed.  You will never be able to share the truth with her.  The only way you will find the justice you both seek is if you search for it together."  He smiled a warm, kind, familiar smile before adding, "I know how strongly you feel about her.  She feels the same for you."

      He stepped back and saluted Mulder before fading back into the shadows.  Mulder came to his decision.

      "They're right," he thought, "I have to go back.  Truth is nothing without justice.  I can't let it die with me.  I have to go back to Scully.  It's all worthless if I can't find it with her.  Take me back.  I WANT TO GO BACK!"

      He suddenly saw light surrounding him, and felt warmth flow through his body.  The light coalesced, and became a fire next to him.  He could see the walls of a small hand-made dwelling, and the old men around him.  He could feel the branches covering his body, and smell the incense and smoke filling the room.  The old man, Albert Hosteen, was pressing a wet cloth to his forehead.  Strength slowly returned to his body, and he swallowed to clear his parched throat.  

      "Water...please..." he rasped.

      One of the old men brought a cup to his lips, and he drank as much as he could swallow, coughing.  Albert Hosteen hovered over him.

      "Rest now.  Your body needs rest.  You are tired from your journey."

      "Do you have any sunflower seeds?" asked Mulder weakly, a faint glimmer of a smile on his face.  The old man put a calloused hand over Mulder's chest, and he felt an overwhelming desire to sleep.  Letting his eyes fall closed, he slipped into a different, comforting darkness from which he for once did not doubt his waking.   

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Short, wasn't it?  The next one will be longer, I promise.  Please review!


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